Firefighters and rescue teams must perform activities under very difficult environmental conditions in fires or other dangerous situations in buildings or industrial plants. Visibility is often greatly reduced due to the smoke occurring in a fire, so that an infrared camera is used as a visual aid.
Furthermore, it is necessary during activities performed in buildings or industrial plants that the mission members must be able to find a certain target, i.e., a person to be rescued or a source of fire within the building or industrial plant or the exit in order to be able to leave the building or the industrial plant. So-called exit finders are used for this, which can determine the position of a member of the rescue team and show the member the direction in which the member of the rescue team has to move in order to reach the target, taking into account the structure of the building or the industrial plant.
To determine the position, exit finders use, for example, GPS or active transmitters or passive transmitters/receivers (RFID, radio frequency identification device), which are placed by the member of the rescue team. The exit finder shows the direction and distance from the last active transmitter placed and thus the direction of or the path leading to the exit. Furthermore, exit finders use WLAN transmitters for determining the position, which were arranged on the outside walls as fixed points at the time of the construction of the building or later. The exit finder receives the data on the structure of a building or industrial plant, for example, from a transponder arranged in the entrance area.
Portable gas sensors are used, for example, to detect toxic or explosive gases. The infrared camera, exit finder and gas sensors are used and carried as separate devices.
A device and process for monitoring the mission of persons using respirators are known from DE 102 59 123 B3. An image detection means receives image signals, which correspond to an image falling on the eyes of the person carrying the device. The instantaneous position of the person carrying the device is determined by analyzing the image signals by means of the topology of the building, which is stored in a storage medium. The person carrying the device can reach the target as a result, i.e., this is only an exit finder. The system is incapable of receiving other categories of information, for example, those of an infrared camera or a gas sensor.
DE 103 47 894 B4 shows a device and process for the controlled entry into or leaving an area. A signal transmitter, which transmits a person-related code, is attached to a person. Position marks represent a position or direction code for passing through an access or exit at entrances and exits of the area. A computing unit analyzes the code of the signal transmitter and the position or direction code received by a receiving means and determines the position of the person. As a result, a state of warning can be triggered when the person reaches a position, or an escape signal showing the escape route can be generated. The device makes it only possible to locate the person, so that additional categories of information that are important for a member of the rescue team in a dangerous situation, e.g., heat images or gas concentrations, cannot be made available.